|  It is a historic edition from the Indian standpoint as one red and three white wines have been submitted from India for the first time. Since the competition is totally a blind tasting, the name of the producer will remain anonymous unless one or more of the wines hopefully win a medal - Great Gold, Gold and Silver medals are awarded to the qualifying wines based on the points scored under the guidelines provided by OIV. The number of participating countries has gone up from 42 last year to 43 this year, perhaps because of the maiden Indian participation.
Started in 2001, the competition has seen a steady growth over the years, though the increase has been insignificant during the last 5 years. There are 6212 samples submitted this year compared to 5726 in 2009, registering a growth of 8% during this period. The increase in samples is in line with the expectation of Christoph Meininger, co-owner of Mundusvini. He had confided to delWine at that time that though they have seen a great jump from over 2000 labels in the maiden edition in 2001, it would not be easy to maintain such pace in the future. Despite the recession, however, the competition saw a steady growth which seems to be a testimonial for the quality and reach in the wine sector, particularly in the Old World.
Although the Red still wines submitted are still in majority with 51% participation, they have marginally come down from 54% last year. Still Whites have seen an increase from 33% to 35% in the same period while Rose remains steady at 3%. Sparkling wines constitute about 8% share with misc. category forming the balance 3% of the basket.
Jury panels consisting of 216 judges, including the lone judge from India, will form 23 panels of 5-7 judges including the panel Chair (my Panel 14 has 6 jury members) from 43 countries during the first leg of the competition being split over two 3-day weekends; the first one from Aug 30-Sept 1 and the next one on 6-8 Sep. The Indian flag will be kept flying by Subhash Arora over both the weekends. As may be expected, the maximum number of judges is from Germany (77), followed by Italy (24), Switzerland (12), France (11) and Austria (8).
Once again, Italy has taken the lead in participation with 1265 samples being from Italy, with Germany following at 1127 and Spain in close contention with 1118 entries. With 578 samples from France and 566 from Portugal, forming the top 5 participating countries, these five Old World countries constitute 75% of the total samples. The top 5 participants from the New World are Australia (194), Chile (177), South Africa (150), Argentina (71) and New Zealand (71).
 The competition is managed by a Board of Directors that includes the well known English wine journalist, author and judge Robert Joseph, who is well-known in India for founding and chairing the now-in-limbo Indian Wine Challenge. ‘The competition is always handled independently by a Tasting Director who ensures that the wines are received, stored and served completely blind and is responsible for maintaining the overall integrity and independence of the competition,’ says Christoph who asserts that neither he nor any Board member can interfere in the competition once its underway.
Susanne Denzer, a familiar and pleasant fixture as the Tasting Director for a number of years, has been on health leave this year and Isabell Dörr is the new Tasting Director this year. Relatively new to the organization, a slightly nervous Isabell informs delWine that she and her team are ready with the task of ensuring that all the wines entered get as fair a chance as humanly possible to vie for the medals.
DelWine wishes all the participants and in particular, the Indian participants a successful Mundusvini.
For one of the earlier reports on the 2012 edition, visit Over 6000 Wines Vie for Medals at MundusVini 2012
Subhash Arora
Neustadt on Weinstrasse- Palatinate Region
30 August, 2013
Tags: Mundusvini, Neustadt, Weinstrasse, Christoph Meininger, Susanne Denzer, Isabell Dörr |